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I wouldn't believe it 😁 (WARNING: this is LONG...)

In chronological order, not order of importance...

- I used a gift card to have lunch at First Watch this afternoon. My bill came to $20.50 (let's take a moment to mourn the days when a $25 gift card got you two meals...), so a 20% tip would be $4.05. I briefly considered just leaving the card but I ultimately decided to put down the tip in cash and save the card for, oh, a cup of coffee in the future. I had a bunch of singles but only a handful of pennies. Initially, I'd done the math wrong in my head and was thinking the tip should be $4.25, and I thought to myself "it's a shame I don't have a quarter on my persona". Literally 30 seconds later, as I was thinking I'd just put down five singles and give the waitress--who was OK but not particularly excellent*--a bigger tip than planned, I dropped a glove in the space between the cushions on the long bench upon which I sat. When I went to grab it, I saw it had literally fallen right next to, yes, a quarter.

* When I say the waitress wasn't "excellent", I mean she seemed a bit distracted, even though neither the restaurant nor her section was full. She barely checked on me during the course of the meal, brought me an order that was *slightly* wrong (I asked for no onions on my sandwich and I got onions--could've been her fault, couldn't been the kitchen's), didn't ask if I needed anything (my sandwich was sloppy; another napkin would've been appreciated) and waited till I was leaving to ask if I wanted another beverage. I didn't, but the time to ask that was halfway through my meal.

- after FW, I nipped into Whole Foods for two things: a couple cans of their no salt added pinto beans (which I use instead of refried beans when we have Mexican for dinner) and a jar of their red enchilada sauce which is low-ER in sodium if not exactly low sodium. There was an empty space on the shelf where the enchilada sauce should've been but I spied a couple jars on the very top shelf where they keep the overstock. It was far too high for me to reach, even standing on my tippy toes (and I'm 5' almost 9" tall) so I would have to find an associate with a ladder or step stool. Luckily, in the aisle next to me, two men were stocking shelves, so I didn't have to look for. And lo and behold, the younger man? Was 6'8" if he was an inch. Maybe he was a teeny bit shorter but I could tell for certain he was taller than my 6'4" father. He didn't even need a ladder to reach the jar of sauce; he just stood on HIS tippy toes and got it down for me.

- on the way back from Whole Foods, I hit Trader Joe's. Actually, I stopped in at the Madewell store first and gave them two pairs of jeans that were ripped beyond repair (or fashion). I like that they will take any brand of jeans and will use them to make housing insulation (if they can't resell them). I laugh that they give you a coupon for $20 off a brand new pair of jeans at their store...their jeans all sell for well over $100 and I won't pay more than $15, maybe $20 for jeans. Anyways, I headed to TJ's to spend the $50 gift card my sister gave me for ("We're NOT exchanging gifts for") Christmas. I picked up some things I needed. I picked up some things I wanted to try. I picked up some zero sodium cereal for Dad and some white cheddar corn puffs that we both love. As I went, I tried to add everything up in my head because I wanted to get as close to $50 as possible. Usually gift cards work more like 50% off coupons for me...if I have a gift card for $25, I'll spend $50 at the store <g>. But today, my total came to $50...and five cents. I'd told the cashier what I was doing but didn't tell her the amount of the gift card. When she told me "$50.05", and I repeated the total back to her with a smile, she grinned and said "Don't tell me you have a $50 gift card!". I gave her five pennies (and the gift card, of course) and left with a spring in my step.

- on the way home, I did something I have very literally never done in my life. I stopped at Discount Drug Mart and asked for a $1 lottery ticket. I've bought lottery tickets for friends before but I've never bought them for myself. I told the elderly gentleman behind the counter that it had been a particularly lucky day and I wanted to see if the streak would continue. I gave him the single I would've given the waitress at FW had I not found a quarter and he warned me that the lottery tickets hadn't been very lucky lately. I joked with him that if I didn't win anything, I was blaming it on him and he laughed and said that'd be fine. And then I scratched off the ticket and...I won $2. Yeah, it wasn't a huge amount but a win's a win. The guy behind the courtesy desk couldn't believe I'd actually won ANYTHING. I told him maybe I should buy a $20 ticket but I'd probably used up all my luck for 2024 and shouldn't push it.

- I came home and in the mail was a nice "no reason" card from Sis, a 30% off coupon from CVS that I'd been hoping to get (they used to send me one a month but haven't in a while; I usually use it to pay for photos I want printed out) and a VISA bill that wasn't as high as I was expecting it to be. Granted, I'd not been keeping track of what was going to be on this VISA bill but any credit card bill that comes after Christmas tends to be bigger than usual, so again I'm counting it as a win.

- and finally, I must have answered enough questions "correctly" in last night's personality quiz/math and verbal skills assessment because I got an e-mail asking me to set up a phone interview with the insurance agent. Again, this isn't a job I'm excited to do, and I'm a bit concerned that the posting has been on Indeed as long as it has. And I wasn't expecting to be informed that I'd need an insurance license no matter what I did at the office--I thought I'd be answering the phone, setting up appointments, sending out reminders and going through the mail. I have no desire to SELL insurance; I barely UNDERSTAND insurance. But hey, as I said, at this point, it's not about finding the perfect job, it's about finding A job. I've spent less than I calculated back when I quit my previous job at the end of April 2023 and could thus go a few months longer before I felt *really* uncomfortable, financially. But I want to be able to occasionally go on a shopping spree at Target again instead of settling for buying a few items I *need* at Dollar Tree.